


너와 난 (sun and rain)

by WennyT



Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ, 밤을 걷는 선비 | Scholar Who Walks the Night (TV), 야경꾼 일지 | The Night Watchman's Journal (TV), 킹덤 | Kingdom (TV 2019)
Genre: (the violence is ~movie magic~), ? - Freeform, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Exactly What It Says on the Tin, Fic within a Fic, Gen, Kingdom's zombies yay!, Meta, Satire, Tongue-in-cheek, Zombies, no highbrow literature here too (again)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-19
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-02-23 05:50:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23206699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WennyT/pseuds/WennyT
Summary: When a crown prince and his personal guard walk intoa barhordes of zombies together.
Relationships: Jung Yunho & Shim Changmin, Jung Yunho/Shim Changmin
Comments: 16
Kudos: 283





	너와 난 (sun and rain)

Joseon. Hanyang is beautiful in the moonlight. 

A man stands at the city walls. There are no visible guards. His robes are dark and of fine linen and silk. They billow in the night breeze. 

He sighs, a long and heavy exhale. His gaze is focused in the distance, towards the imperial palace. 

There is a rustle behind him. He tilts his head slightly towards the noise.

"My Prince," the murmur is low. "There is nothing wrong with looking. However, it will do Highness good to retire to the palace. To rest."

"Ah, our Mooseok," the prince turns back to the view. "Always managing me. Yet so polite. Your time as a hostage in the Central Plains has done you wonders for your skills in tact and diplomacy. Fifteen years ago, you would have thrown a rock away from me and shouted for me to go to bed."

A scrape against the flagstones. Mooseok must have stepped forward deliberately. Oh dear. He must be furious. "Highness."

"Did I offend you?" The prince chuckles. "Poor Mooseok. It must have been a shock. Ten years away with my poor imperial brother at the Ming court, and back only when he was executed. Now Yoon must seem like practically another person to you."

A pause, and then tightly, "Mooseok will dare to speak against Highness, and advise Highness to return to the palace. Where he rightfully belongs, as the crown prince."

Yoon laughs. It's an unprincely snort, and not a particularly happy sound. He tilts his head. "Do I? Belong there? My imperial father refuses to see me."

Mooseok has his head lowered, for all he's standing a pace apart from Yoon. His hands are clasped together behind his back. "His Majesty is ill. He is ignorant of Highness's efforts."

"Careful," Yoon laughs again, rusty and low. "You are sounding awfully treasonous there."

"A personal guard's loyalty is to his master, the Crown Prince," Mooseok states, even. "To his future king."

Yoon eyes him, amused. "Do you know that the queen has announced she is pregnant?"

Mooseok had been standing with shoulders back, feet apart. He straightens even more. "Mooseok dares not comment on the private affairs of the King. That includes Majesty's harem."

"Harem," Yoon smirks, and steps forward. "That bitch will have your tongue if she heard you lumping her together with the rest of the concubines."

Mooseok lowers his head in a bow, and backs away, pivoting to walk a step behind him, when Yoon strides towards and past him. "It is very fortuitous that Mooseok is in private conversation with Highness."

Yoon claps a hand onto Mooseok's shoulder. "You always know how to cheer me up. Ah, well. Back to the palace it is, as you said. My ear is so easily bent by you!"

Mooseok demurs.

Yoon hums, and chuckles. "Perhaps I shall pay my _dear_ imperial mother a visit."

\--

_"Cut," the director blares through a foghorn. "Take’s okay, but can we do another?"_

_"Of course," Yunho says, head no longer lowered, and beaming instead. He’s pushed his_ gat _off of his head, and holds the traditional hat instead in one hand. The ribbons are crumpled._

_"Can I have another heat pack," Changmin raises his hand. Not that he can feel the particular appendage._

_Seoul is cold today, and the draft is especially bad since they're shooting at the old eastern city gate. There is no central heating and only so many ways to bundle when your costume is layers of thin silk for historical accuracy._

_He’s got woollen long johns on beneath but they feel like cotton instead._

_"Get Changmin-ssi three heat packs," the director instructs, still through the foghorn. Changmin supposes the entire set heard him. And then some._

_Yunho flings him a Look. "Isn't this your fourth? What are you doing, eating them? You need to stop clenching your teeth while saying your lines. It isn’t that cold.”_

_“Hyung,” Changmin feels compelled to point out. “Between the two of us, who’s the one who won awards for his acting?”_

_Yunho just lifts his chin at him. “Who’s the one monitoring your performances for more than twenty years, now?”_

_“Lee Soo Man seongsaeng-nim,” Changmin deadpans. He’s heartened when Yunho throws his head back, for an actual laugh._

_Oh. The director is still blaring._

_“-more indolent bitterness, Changmin-ssi.” The man is seated barely ten metres from them. Changmin doesn’t understand why he doesn’t just come over but hey, he isn’t about to ask and be seen as yet another spoilt has-been idol. “You need to remember while Yoon sees Mooseok as more than just another servant, right now he still believes he is more than Mooseok’s equal. The fondness in your voice is good. Just. Be more regal.”_

_“Got it. Mooseok’s not furniture, he’s pretty furniture,” Changmin calls out, and then in an aside to Yunho, “he wants Yoon to order Mooseok around. Why didn’t they cast you as the crown prince, again? You’ve got years of experience under your belt ordering people around. Namely me.”_

_Yunho just slings an arm around him, to Changmin’s relief. His hyung runs naturally hotter than the rest of them mere mortals, Changmin included. It's nice. His own personal neck-warmer. "Because I’ve got experience in other things that you don’t.”_

_“Like looking all noble and righteous?” Changmin says. “I can do that. Long speeches? I can do that too. I’ve got all your trainee monologues memorised. Minseok helped. He made Powerpoint slides.”_

_“Spinning kicks,” Yunho offers. With his other hand, he takes the heat packs the hapless personal assistant brings over, and gives one to Changmin. The others, he tucks into his pockets shamelessly. “And also, my resting bitch face is better than yours.”_

_\--_

“My son,” the queen drawls. She’s sprawled in a divan placed in the centre of her receiving chamber. The roundness of her stomach strains against the hanbok in an almost obscene curve. “You look well.”

“Mother.” Yoon bares his teeth. Mooseok is a silent shadow behind him. “You look… pregnant.” 

“My imperial child brings me much joy,” the queen allows. Around her, her court ladies and palace maids titter. “Ah, the wonders of impending motherhood.”

She leans back and accepts a piece of fruit from one of the ladies-in-waiting. Her grin is savage and sharp. “A pity that your conception could not bless me with such bliss.” 

“It might have been challenging,” the chill in Yoon’s voice is colder than the northern winds blowing in, “considering how my imperial mother was naught but a twinkle in our diligent Chief State Councillor’s eye, until I was ten years of age.”

The queen doesn’t deign to respond. Instead, her first lady-in-waiting steps forward with a sharp bark, “The Crown Prince dares to disrespect Her Majesty thus!” 

The eunuchs and maids fall on their knees. 

Yoon’s guards tense, hands on their sword hilts. In Yoon’s peripheral gaze, Mooseok is absolutely still.

“Just stating a fact,” Yoon says easily. 

\--

_“Sorry,” Changmin says immediately, looking towards where the scriptwriter and director are huddled together in front of the broadcast monitor. “Can we try that again? I slipped out of period dialect.”_

_“It was a good take,” the scriptwriter pipes up, but the director offers a thumbs up. Everyone starts moving; the lighting crew to reset, the camera crew to lay again the tracks for the rolling equipment, the extras back to their marks, the makeup artists to offer touch-ups to their respective charges._

_“Fifteen minutes to roll,” the assistant director calls out. “Break for the principals in the meantime.”_

_Yunho finally relaxes out of the soldier stance he’s adopted for Mooseok. Changmin leans into him, “about the lyrics for your solo ballad in the next-”_

_They both start at a presence hovering in the corner of their eyes, and turn._

_The girl playing the queen beams up at both of them. “Oppa-deul! I grew up listening to your songs.”_

_“Oh. Thanks,” Changmin says, and tries not to feel depressed. Next to him, Yunho stands straight and practically vibrates with excitement. “Really! That’s amazing to hear! Thank you so much!”_

_“Yes, yes,” she gushes. She’s quite a lovely-looking girl, now that she isn’t curling her lip in a sneer and flaring her nostrils at them. 'Girl' being the keyword. “My middle-school classmates and I would dance to Keep Your Head Down! We won a competition with it! I’m Cassiopeia!”_

_The smile on Yunho’s face gets a little strained, and even more sparkling. “Oh! Have you heard of us before that?”_

_Changmin raises a hand reflexively to ruffle at his hair. He pauses when he remembers that he’s got a wig on._

_In front of them, the girl’s excited grin turns a little confused. “Keep Your Head Down wasn’t oppa-deul’s debut?”_

_“Ah…” Yunho’s head goes a little back, and he laughs hard._

_Too hard. His cackle is almost shrill._

_Changmin just pats her on her head._ Her _wig prickles at his palm. It's itchy. “So how are we, for old men?”_

_It does the trick. She gasps, and goes into the customary protestations of, “oppa-deul are not old! Still so handsome! I love watching you two act! It’s good that you decide to come back into acting now! We are- we are T!”_

_Over the top of her head, Changmin mouths at Yunho, who’s still tight around the eyes and still laughing,_ we’re such old men.

_That, at least, makes Yunho chuckle for real._

_Relief makes Changmin smile._

\--

“Something is wrong,” Yoon whispers, eyes on the fires in the distance. “Hanyang is burning.”

“Yes,” Mooseok steps up to him, and lays a gentle but firm arm at the crook of his elbow. “But we must now away, Highness. The queen is-”

“I need to see my father,” Yoon says savagely. “There’s something wrong with my people. I cannot just leave! To run, like the basest of cowards!” 

\--

_“Cut!” The director cries. “Good take.”_

_Yunho grins, and pats Changmin’s cheek. “Not bad for an old man.”_

\--

“Mooseok,” Yoon gasps, backing into the wall. His people are- His people are somehow _rabid_. They’re frothing at the mouth- and they bite- they _eat_ each other- and they die- and they rise again- and they _eat-_

One of them snaps its jaws at him, bloodied teeth closing barely an inch from Yoon’s face. The force of its bite makes it sever its own tongue. That falls on the floor with an oily-sounding splat. 

Yoon has got his sword out, and he stabs at it, crying out when its spine severs with a wet crack. But Mooseok- _where is Mooseok-_

Mooseok, who’s just told him that he is willing to stand as a traitor to the nation, to Yoon’s imperial father, to run with Yoon, to forsake all he knows, and to fight for Yoon’s throne- 

“Mooseok!” Yoon bellows, and swings his sword again, and again, because the dead who are rabid just keep coming- and _coming-_

“Highness,” there is a blur of movement, and Mooseok is behind him, and then back-to-back with him. Blood splatters in an arc from his sword. “Here!” 

They fight, hacking and chopping and stabbing and cutting down. It’s ugly and desperate and almost primal.

Fear is a clawing sensation in Yoon’s throat, and when he breathes, there’s the taste of blood in his mouth. Not his. 

The scent of freshly butchered - _slaughtered_ \- meat is in the air, cloying and sweet and iron-like.

Yoon realises that Mooseok is edging them down an alley, which serves as a chokepoint for the rabid, and then somehow the two of them manage to wedge themselves into a room, and against a door. 

It barely holds, but it holds. 

A rabid dead has the top of its head wedged into a small crack between the slats of the wood, at eye level. Its mouth is gnawing away at the wood, and the whites of its eyes -what’s left of them- are showing. A ear dangles by a thin piece of cartilage, a wet slapping against its neck. 

Mooseok jams his bloodied sword into its mouth, cursing.

Yoon grabs for his arm. “ _Where were you?_ ”

\--

_"Cut!" The director says. "Hold."_

_Changmin freezes, his face an inch from Yunho's. His fingers are clutched tight around Yunho's blood-spattered sleeve._

_His hyung, he realises, has very long eyelashes. They sweep down instead of curling._

_"Yes, but, Changmin-ssi," Director-nim is exasperated. "Yoon is supposed to look at Mooseok with 'suspicion and longing and frustration', because Mooseok has just forsaken his family for him and now suddenly they’ve got bitey dead coming after them from all sides. He's not supposed to look at Mooseok like he's his next meal. That comes later."_

_"You want a power bar, Changdol?" Yunho wants to know, solicitous. His arm trembles minutely under Changmin's hand, with the strain of holding up against the door prop. "I tweaked the recipe after you said there was too much banana in the last one."_

_The zombie extra opposite them perks up. His breath is minty fresh. "Can I have one? It's all the running and snarling… My breakfast was six hours ago."_

_"Fuck your power bars," Changmin snaps. No Yunho should be allowed to cook, even if it's simple gymrat snacks. And no man should have eyelashes that long. His_ dogs _have shorter eyelashes. "You'll poison me."_

_"Yes!" The director exclaims. "Just like that. That frustration and bemusement and affection. Perfect. Okay, crew to set for cleanups. Our Crown Prince, Mooseok-yah, please continue holding."_

\--

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I don't know where this is going... This thing came out of a 'what if?' brain fart that happened during conversation. The real-life parallels that can be drawn between Kingdom Season 2 and the current COVID19 situation is astounding. \o/
> 
> Inspiration for this Frankenstein mashup: Rampant (Bin-ssi!!) meets Night Scholar meets Night Watchman meets Kingdom meets Pride&Prejudice&Zombies meets all the palace dramas I've ever watched...... 
> 
> Do note that this is meant to be firmly tongue-in-cheek. It is literally titled 'joseon crack homin au with zombies' in my Googledocs. My sense of humour can be quite warped at times, so I can only hope it made some readers laugh. Laughter's nice, in these uncertain times.
> 
> Comments are love. x Stay safe and healthy, all.


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